


Unavoidable

by beloved_key



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Fluff, Gen or Pre-Slash, Illness, M/M, Sickfic, Whump, others are mentioned - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-05
Updated: 2018-12-05
Packaged: 2019-09-12 00:55:59
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,370
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16863193
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/beloved_key/pseuds/beloved_key
Summary: “Keeeeeeith, help me.” Lance whined, sniffling and nuzzling Keith’s chest with his fevered brow. Just as suddenly as Lance had given up his charade, Keith realized how he was going to react to this.He blushed.





	Unavoidable

When the people of Entari Prime had insisted upon a diplomatic envoy of only four, the first few choices had been obvious. Allura, of course; her royal upbringing meant that she had training in diplomatic relations, not to mention her being in charge of their whole seven-person, giant-robot rebellion. Shiro, too, was obvious; the leader of Voltron, level-headed (Slav incident aside), reassuringly strong presence, it just made sense. Hunk, too, was fairly obvious; thus far his naturally likeable aura had proven to be fairly universal. In fact, there was only one choice that Lance didn’t get…

“Why’d Pidge win out over me?” He demanded, mildly indignant. He was talkative, he was likeable, he’d proven an asset on similar diplomatic excursions before; why wasn’t he picked for this mission?

Pointedly ignoring the stink-eye Pidge was shooting, Allura stepped forward to explain. “It’s less about you and more about the Entari, Lance. You see, they have very… Fast-pace romantic practices. We’re just worried that--”

“I’d flirt with the wrong person and ruin the mission?” Lance finished dejectedly.

“Actually, Allura was more worried about you making a passing comment and ending up betrothed and carted off to the honeymoon suite before you could explain yourself.” Shiro corrected gently. “I know you can take these things seriously, Lance, it’s just… A lot of your mannerisms are naturally flirtatious. Even if you didn’t think you were flirting, and most other people wouldn’t think it either, the Entari might not see it that way.”

“Wait, so, if Lance complemented an Entari, they might think he was proposing marriage?” Hunk asked. Lance shot him a glare, which Hunk responded to with his most innocent face.

“So, then, why not Keith? He’s the least romantic person in space.” Lance asked. He sure was getting a lot of dirty looks this briefing.

To Lance’s delight, Coran answered. “Well, that’s because the Entari’s views on hate are very similar to their ideas about love. A mildly contentious comment could be construed as a challenge to a deathmatch.”

Keith’s scowl deepened at Lance’s laughter, but the meeting quickly fell back on track after that. Soon enough, the group was off, dressed in full Altean formalwear (which only Allura managed to pull off with grace), leaving Coran, Keith, and Lance to entertain themselves for the next few days.

\---

“Ah, Keith, my boy!”

Keith glanced up from his breakfast food goo, raising his eyebrows. Coran correctly interpreted this as invitation to continue.

“I was wondering if you’d seen Lance around? He’s usually up by now, and I thought he seemed a bit… Off, yesterday.”

“What’s ‘off’ about Lance complaining ‘cause he was left out of an away mission?” Keith grumbled, still a bit sore about the deathmatch comment. “Also, no, I haven’t.”

“Oh, no, that incident was quite in character.” Coran agreed. “I just meant after that. He retired rather early, and he was a bit… Lethargic, when he was helping me clean the control room before that.”

Keith shrugged. “I don’t know. Maybe he’s just tired? Slept in?”

“Perhaps…” Coran still didn’t seem convinced, muttering more to himself than to Keith at this point. “There haven’t been any particularly strenuous missions the past few quintants, though…”

Keith, no stranger at this point to Coran’s overconcerned, fatherly nature, especially when it came to Lance (there was a running joke amongst the paladins that Lance was Coran’s favorite, and it wasn’t exactly untrue), just sighed. “You want me to go check on him?”

“Oh! Well, since you’re volunteering, I’d greatly appreciate it!” Coran brightened immediately. “I’d do it myself, any other day, but I’ve a lot of complicated diagnostics to run. The teludav’s been finicky ever since we put in those new lenses, I’d like to see if I can’t tighten things up a bit… Come to think of it, I’d really better get started. I’ll check back in this evening!”

With a passing comment telling Keith to call him if there were any problems, Coran rushed off to the engine room, leaving Keith to finish off his breakfast and go in search of Lance.

A knock on Lance’s door several minutes later elicited a satisfying yelp, a momentary scramble, and then the swish of the door opening, revealing Lance’s severely bedhead-ridden self.

“Keith! Uh… ‘Sup?” Lance’s voice was rough with sleep, but that wasn’t what struck Keith as odd.

“Where’s your mask?”

“Huh?”

Keith gestured to Lance’s uncovered face. “The face mask. For your skin. It’s not there.”

Lance blinked, brought a hand up to his cheek, then grinned sheepishly. “I, uh… Already washed it off! Yeah, that’s it.”

Keith crossed his arms and leaned up against the doorframe. “Uh huh. So you definitely weren’t just asleep?”

“Nope.” Lance sniffed, running a hand under his nose. “What makes you think that?”

“You… are your pants on backwards?”

Lance’s gaze slowly shifted down to his legs, which were, in fact, clad in backwards pants. Yelping again, Lance flicked the ‘close door’ button, ignoring Keith’s indignant squawk and the fact that the red paladin’s jacket was caught in between the sliding panels.

A moment later, and the door slid open again, revealing a red-faced Lance and a pissed-off Keith.

“If you ripped my jacket, I swear--” Keith muttered, inspecting his sleeve.

“Hischiew!”

Keith’s gaze snapped back to Lance, whose nose was now buried in his elbow as he blinked dazedly.

“What was that?”

Lance took a second to think about that one.

Straightening up and swiping at his nose, he sniffled. “I was dabbing. Duh.”

“Uh huh.” Dabbing the snot off his nose, more like. Now that Keith was looking, though, Lance looked more… Flushed, than embarrassed. And his voice should’ve lost that post-sleep roughness by now… “You feeling okay?”

“Stellar.” Lance grumbled, then cleared his throat. “I’m just allergic to your bullshit.”

“Right.” Keith wasn’t about to let Lance get a rise out of him, not when he looked downright pathetic this morning. Plus, Coran would have him on cleaning duty for a month if he had a fight with Lance while he was clearly under the weather. “Seriously, you don’t look so hot.”

“I always look hot.” Lance retorted, blinking hard and swaying slightly.

Keith sighed. “Okay, fine. I only stopped by because Coran wanted me to check on you, so if you’re so ‘okay,’ I’ll just--oof!”

At some point while Keith was trying to excuse himself, Lance’s swaying had resulted in him slumping against the other boy’s chest. Keith froze, unsure of how to react to this.

“Keeeeeeith, help me.” Lance whined, sniffling and nuzzling Keith’s chest with his fevered brow. Just as suddenly as Lance had given up his charade, Keith realized how he was going to react to this.

He blushed.

“So you’re sick?” He finally managed to force out. Lance whimpered and nodded. “Okay. Uh… Do you want to go to bed?”

“On any other day I’d make some kind of comment about you taking me to bed, but right now I feel like utter quiznack.”

“I don’t think you’re using that word correctly.” Keith quipped, regaining himself enough to gently guide Lance back into his bed. “You’ll get it some day, don’t worry.”

Lance’s response, for once, was very effective in shutting Keith up, as it was to drag him unceremoniously onto the bed with him and latch on in an undeniable snuggle. He then had the audacity to fall immediately asleep, leaving Keith in quite the predicament.

What was he supposed to do? He couldn’t just leave. Lance was using him as a pillow. And hugging him. And getting up would be tantamount to standing when you had a cat on your lap. It just isn’t done.

So when the diplomatic mission ended successfully, and the others returned, Coran pulled them aside to show photographic evidence of this latest “bonding moment.” Hunk was the only one not surprised. Allegedly, Lance’s notorious, fever-induced cuddle ambushes had led him to miss far too many classes back at the Garrison, and Lance was absolutely shameless about it. Keith asked if there was any way to prevent it in the future.

Hunk’s answer was no, but Keith didn’t seem as disappointed as the yellow paladin had expected him to be.

**Author's Note:**

> I'm not super proud of this one tbh, but I figured I'd post it anyway. Thanks for reading, feel free to comment/kudos if you liked it!


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